The present invention relates to a heat exchanger for a vehicle. More particularly, the present invention relates to a connecting structure of a heat exchanger having a condenser arranged in front of a radiator.
In a vehicle, generally, an engine room is provided, on its front side, with an automotive heat exchanger including a radiator for cooling engine cooling water, a condenser for condensing air conditioning refrigerant, an oil cooler for cooling transmission oil of an automatic transmission of the vehicle, etc.
In these constituents of the heat exchanger, the condenser is formed by a core part as heat exchanging area and upper and lower pipes connected to the core part. Being arranged above and below the core part, the above pipes serve to supply and discharge the refrigerant to and from the core part.
In detail, the upper pipe is provided, at one end thereof, with an inlet for introducing the refrigerant, which has been fed from an air conditioning cycle, into the refrigerant passage in the pipe and further the core part. While, the lower pipe is provided, at an end thereof on the opposite side of the inlet of the upper pipe, with an outlet for the refrigerant. These inlet and outlet of the pipes are connected to pipes on the side of the air conditioning cycle through the intermediary of corresponding blocks. In this way, the condenser does form a part of the air conditioning cycle (Japanese Patent Publication No. 2000-18880).
In the conventional structure, the inlet and the outlet are positioned above and below the core part and also in opposite positions in the horizontal direction, as mentioned above. Therefore, when connecting the air conditioning cycle to the condenser, an operator has to change an operator's posture left, right, up and down whenever connecting each block to the inlet and outlet of the refrigerant passages above and below the core part. For such a reason, the above structure is disadvantageous in view of working efficiency.